The King Of Fighters XII Punches Its Way Into Homes Everywhere In July

The King of Fighters XII is getting the fastest arcade to console conversion in the history of the series outside of playing an arcade cartridge on a Neo Geo. SNK will bring their “KOF Re-Birth” to arcades in Japan this April. Three months later the console version comes out on the PlayStation 3 and Xbox 360 worldwide. Ignition will publish the King of Fighters XII domestically.

With such a short window between the arcade release and home version it’s hard to imagine SNK beefing up the character roster like they did with other King of Fighters games. Perhaps, SNK will distribute post-release expansion packs with additional characters as downloadable content?

Fast arcade to console release? Sounds like bad news for arcades. And with only 20 characters, seems like KOF12 is a testbed for the new hardware like how Neowave was…

pressstart

Bad for arcades indeed. Didn’t they learn from what happened with Namco and T5?

Anyway, looks nice, but I’m not too fond of the art style in general. Looks like HD Art of Fighting 3 (Ryo looks like he did in AoF3, using the generic stance instead of his unique tiger stance he had for quite a while).

Chow

Arcades have been decline for the longest time anyway. I can’t remember the last time I’ve actually spent money in one.

http://www.youtube.com/user/ArcadeInfinity scott

why do people keep saying that? It’s like the chic thing to say now. And japanese arcades are drastically different than US arcades. compare that to a japanese arcade i walked in with 15 SF4 machines, to the american one with NFL Blitz and Metal Slug 1

Chow

You just answered your own question there. And take a look around. It’s true, at least where I live.

daizyujin

Ignition probably also wants to get it out here in the states as quick as possible. Sure it might be damaging some arcade earnings in Japan but if the PS3 version came out here first, then SNK would loose sales of the game with hardcore players just importing the already released US version.

kevin

Ugh… so I can kind of understand that SFIV has a decent amount going on in the engine, and have accepted Capcom’s reluctance to do anything major on the Wii. But with the VC, various Neo Geo collections, etc, I thought for certain that the Wii would get KOF XII out of the gate. I dont’ care if the resolution will be lower, there is nothing that should keep it off of the system. The Classic Controller is better than any of the standard pads on 360 and PS3, there’s just no excuse. Hopefully it will be revealed later on, but I feel like SNK should be nestling up with Nintendo and their 2D revivals, because that’s where their games could flourish instead of getting lost in a sea of 3D.

daizyujin

Perhaps but a lot of KOF junkies just want the game arcade perfect. They don’t care if they have to buy a PS3 or 360 to play it. This is the type of title that is definition of hardcore to me. I am not sure too many people that are psyched for this game would want a slimmed down port with the other consoles offering arcade perfect renditions. Keep in mind these are the people that spent $600 on a console back in 1990 and $130-$250 on each game just to have “the arcade experience” at home.

That being said, it was probably cheaper to port to the PS3 and 360 than having to go through and reedit everything down to be playable on the Wii. This isn’t polygons we are talking about. I am not sure but wouldn’t they have to do some substantial redrawing on the sprites to make it look decent in SD?

EvilAkito

I doubt the resolution is really the concern here. The PS3 and 360 versions can still be played in 480i, which is the only option for players using composite or s-video cables. The pitfall is that the game would most likely need to be re-programmed from the ground up for Wii. It’s not like a VC release or a collection disc where they can just run the games through an emulator. I guess what it really comes down to is whether or not there is a big enough audience for the game on Wii to really justify the cost.

I certainly hope SNK can make it happen, but I do have my doubts.

Darrien

It’s not that they would have to sacrifice anything to make a Wii version, I think, but just the general audience they are aiming the game at. With fighting games, and certainly KOF, the target audience is the hardcore crowd, usually those that already have played the games. I don’t think it’s arguable that the Wii’s main groups are the young (7-14 or so) and the elderly (usually 30+), while the PS3/360 aim more towards the middle group (15-25ish), which would be the crowd that grew up with these games. Plus, does anyone even have sales figures for the KOF Collection on the Wii, PS2, and PSP? I just don’t see the Wii, no matter how many units it has sold, as being a good home for this at all.

daizyujin

That is a very good point Darrien. It works both way. Most casual games that have been made for the HD systems have flopped quite hard, at least the ones outside of direct download. It stands to reason that this would work in reverse and games like No More Heroes has pretty much shown that is indeed true.

I would stand to guess that the KOF Collection might have sold better on PS2, especially since you can pick it up for under $10 in some stores.

EvilAkito

Well, I sort of disagree. 2D fighters are a niche genre no matter which platform we’re talking about. The gaming media paints the picture that the hardcore gamers (who play Call of Duty and Gears of War) play 360 and PS3, whereas the casual games (who play Wii Sports and Wii Fit) play the Wii, but the market statistics really aren’t that simple. I, for one, own only a Wii. I don’t play hardcore first person shooters nor do I play crappy simple games, so I don’t fit in either of the gaming media’s two classifications. But I will play a 2D fighter. And there are plenty of people on the same boat as me.

I don’t know the sales data for Wii’s various 2D fighters (such as KoF Collection, Guilty Gear, and the various VC releases), nor do I have a good guess as to how well a North American release of Tatsunoko Vs Capcom would perform (like that’s ever going to happen anyway). But I am willing to bet that the niche audience is probably pretty evenly spread out among each console’s core user-base.

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